Archive for August 2007

We are one week to our Beta milestone – the loose definition of which is our first build with 0 bugs. I currently sit with just one bug on my plate, and a minor one at that. I am not what you would call an industry vet or anything, but in my 6 years, I have *never* been on a project that's gone this easily. Thank god, though – after two years doing online programming for Tiger, I seriously needed an easy project.

We've begun discussing where we would like to be assigned after the project finishes (should be mid-September), and I think it's time for me to start exploring other career paths within the game industry. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the subtle differences between what they call a Producer here, and what they call Development Director. Supposedly, the Producer handles the building of the game, and the Director handles the building of the software. In practice, though, there is so much overlap between the two, it's hard to tell which one I'd rather try first.

I think I always knew that I didn't want to be a programmer forever. There are people who are born to be programmers (Jon is one), who work all day at a computer and then come home only to play on their own side programming projects. It's just not me. I do my work, try and concentrate on the fun I'm creating by building this game, go home, and do something completely different. I knit, cook, bake, sometimes play games, whatever it takes to get the programming out of my head. It's always been that sense of creating fun that kept me going. I think through one of these other career paths within the industry, I can get that same sense without actually programming. I imagine a day where I might turn on the computer at home to do some hobbyist programming here and there, and really enjoying myself because I'm not completely burned out on it at work.

Whoops, looks like another bug just came in. Time to get back to work 🙂

It was a great trip. We first spent a few days at Jon's parents' house in southern New Hampshire. They took us to brunch at a maple farm, and to visit Strawberry Banke, the historical living museum in Portsmouth.

Their house is in the middle of nowhere, so it was really relaxing to just sit in the backyard with a Yuengling and my yarn. The weather was fantastic; whenever it started to get really humid, it would just rain for a few minutes and then it would be fine.

After New Hampshire (we weren't quite ready to leave yet), the folks drove us down to Boston, about an hour's drive away. There we caught a Blue Man Group show (fantastic!), visited Harvard's Natural History Museum, took a walk on the Freedom Trail, and toured the USS Cassin Young destroyer.

Jon's old roommate lives there, so we had good company.

Good eats from the trip include a gigantic roast beef sandwich from Bentley's Roast Beef, buffalo wings, and clam chowder.

For keeping idle hands busy, I finished up a pair of socks I had been working on, and started (and finished!) a Gryffindor scarf for the Harry Potter book release festivities.

I wish we had spent more time out there; New Hampshire in particular was fantastic. Gotta finish my game, though, and get ready for Christmas in Hawaii!!

Let's see…last post was April something….time to play catch-up I guess.

Everyone who reads this blog should already know that Jon and I moved in together over Memorial Day weekend. If you don't, well, now you do (and what kind of friend are you?!?!?). We've been getting good and settled in over the last few months, and it's mostly great. The biggest problem we have so far is that the house is pretty run-down, and there are a massive amount of spiders around the property (and the neighborhood). Armed with Raid, we've cleaned up the backyard. I even started a little herb garden in the back yard to help save money. Between that and the Saturday farmers' market, I hardly need to visit the Safeway produce department anymore.

The other issue we're working through is trying to figure out how to get Dom to stop being so effing noisy all the time. He likes to go into one of the upstairs bathrooms, when we're all downstairs, and meow at the top of his lungs for no particular reason. The Internet's advice is just to “ignore him”. Duh.

We had our housewarming party just two weeks after moving in (we set a “milestone” to make sure we got unpacked and settled in quickly). We almost ran out of meat, and ended up with a fridge overstocked with beer. Hooray friends!